Mayhem in Christmas River: A Christmas Cozy Mystery (Christmas River Cozy, Book 2) (15 page)

I struggled to catch my breath. I couldn’t remember where I was. What time it was. Who I was. All I could see was the bright red light of my nightstand clock blinking
3:23
. My heart was racing.

I sat up, grabbed the glass of water off the nightstand and downed it as everything came back to me.

I was at home. Everything was okay. I was okay. It had just been a dream. An unpleasant one, but a dream nonetheless.

I swung my legs over the bed, the cool wood floor feeling good against my hot skin. I leaned over, cradled my head in my hands, and tried to regroup.

Dad. I hadn’t dreamed about him in years. I’d think about him from time to time, but I thought that I’d finally come to a stage in my life where I’d moved past it. Moved past him leaving my mom and me.

When he left, I’d get letters from him every couple of weeks. But as the years wore on, it amounted to only birthday and Christmas cards. He’d moved out to Pennsylvania and gotten remarried. That’s what I overheard anyway one night when my mom was talking to Warren.

But when mom died, that overshadowed everything. All my sorrow went into that tragedy, and I couldn’t afford to think about my dad much more after that.

When he didn’t come back home for mom’s funeral, Warren was furious with him.

My dad stopped sending cards after that.

The day I graduated from college, I got a note from him. It was a generic
Congrats Grad
note with only his signature and a check for $500.

I sent every penny back along with his heartless card.

I hadn’t heard anything from him since.

Some people in my situation may have wanted to track him down. To establish some sort of relationship with him.

But I never wanted that. He’d walked out my life that day, and there was nothing left to say. It was finished. Over and done with.

And anyways, I always had Warren to lean on. And I was lucky for that. He’d raised me and been the father my dad never had the courage to be.

I’d been able to move on.

But dreams like this made me angry, the way they dredged all those memories back up again. Memories that I wanted to keep buried in a dark dungeon.

I stood up and walked over to my bedroom window. I looked outside at the large white flashlight of a moon that hung suspended high in the sky.

I thought about Daniel. About earlier. About him opening the car door for Stephanie. About her sloppily leaning on him to get in.

Was it really just tipsiness from all that sangria, or did she know what she was doing?

I hated thinking these thoughts. But like all bad thoughts, once you start thinking them, others have a way of climbing in.

Did Daniel really just want some time alone to clear his head? Or was there something else going on?

Something that was going to hurt really bad when I found out?

Was Daniel thinking about quitting on me?

Had he?

Was he really at home alone tonight?

My mind raced. I looked out the window at the eerie blue landscape. The house creaked in the wild winds.

I let out a long, frustrated sigh.

There was no way I’d be able to climb back into bed and sleep tonight. 

I was gripped by some sort of force outside of my control. Some sort of feverish paranoia. The wildness of the night had seeped into me somehow and was turning me into a mad woman. 

I changed quickly into my usual running outfit. I threw on a pair of sneakers and grabbed Huckleberry’s leash. He sat up, alert from his position sleeping at the foot of my bed.

“Are you up for a little walk, Hucks?” I said, leaning over the bed and hooking the leash to his collar.

He wagged his nub happily, not holding any grudges against me waking him up from his peaceful slumber.

“Let’s go,” I whispered.

He jumped down from the bed, his claws scraping against the wood floor. I quietly walked past Warren’s room and then downstairs.

I grabbed my house keys and walked out the front door into the blustery, bright night. 

I took off down the sidewalk towards Daniel’s house.

Chapter 36

I dug my hands into the pockets of my hoody and picked up the pace as I crossed the quiet streets of downtown. They were decorated with red and green banners and silver tinsel in preparation for the Christmas River in July festivities. The pine trees had large ornaments hanging from them that rapped against the branches in the wind.

Even though this was Christmas River, it still seemed unnatural to see all these decorations in the middle of summer.

I walked by my silent shop and then by the burned out remnants of Kara’s ornament store. There was still yellow caution tape blocking it off. I passed by Bailey’s
Wicked Pastry
shop, shuddering as I remembered the way she had pleaded for my help.

Huckleberry led the way in front of me. He kept looking back at me, like he was making sure it was okay for him to be out at this hour.

Or maybe he just thought I was crazy. I didn’t blame him. We were having the same thought. The closer I got to Daniel’s house, the more I wondered if I wasn’t losing my mind. If I hadn’t fallen deep into some sort of schizoid paranoia that had long been buried deep inside me.

I shivered, even though it wasn’t that cold. The bad feelings of the dream still lingered with me, haunting each step I took.

I hadn’t ever thought about it before, but maybe those feelings… those feelings of abandonment and betrayal hadn’t started with Evan leaving me for another woman, the way I always thought they had.

The roots of those feelings went much deeper than that.

I wasn’t any fan of psychology or delving too deeply into my emotions. Maybe that’s why it had taken me so long to figure some of this out. I didn’t like thinking about it. For me, it was always easier to push feelings aside, to push them under the rug, under the bed, under the couch… anywhere where they’d be hidden from view and I wouldn’t have to look at them.

Maybe that was why I was out here tonight, afraid of another man in my life leaving me again.

But if that was the case, then why did I find it so hard to commit to him? If I was so afraid of him leaving, why hadn’t I done everything I could to make sure he stayed?

I didn’t know.

I started passing through the Old Town neighborhood where the houses were older and more rundown than the new two-story, open floor plan developments that they were building on the east side of town. 

I didn’t know what I would do when I got to Daniel’s house. I didn’t know what I would say, or how I would explain what I was doing out here at four in the morning.

All I knew was that I had to see his face.

“Please let him be there,” I whispered out loud into the moonlit night. “Just please let him be there.”

My mind raced with all the dreaded possibilities of what could be.

Chapter 37

I stood in front of his door, waiting.

I knocked for the fourth time, pounding hard against the peeling door.

Nothing.

My heart was plummeting like an elevator with busted brakes.

Where was he?

And did I really want to know the answer to that question?

Would I find him at Stephanie’s hotel?

I knocked one last time. Four slow, defeated knocks.

Nothing again. 

Huckleberry looked up at me and let out a short whimper before pacing back and forth on the porch.

I sighed, wanting to sob instead. I started descending the steps of his porch, beaten.

I sat down for a moment, resting my head in my hands. The cruel winds kicked up and pushed a lonely dust devil of pine needles right through me.

I closed my eyes.

“I blew it,” I said. “Blew it all to smithereens.”

I felt stunned and shattered all at the same time. Somehow, I couldn’t cry. The tears just wouldn’t come up.

Huckleberry nudged under my arm and whimpered some more. He didn’t like seeing people upset. I ran my fingers through his silky fur, and tried to reassure him that I was okay.

But I wasn’t.

After a few sorry minutes like that, I finally found the strength to stand up and leave.

I descended the steps, went down the walkway and out to the sidewalk.

I looked at his dark house for a minute before leaving.

Sometimes you think something good will last forever. But in a split second, it falls apart and disintegrates into ash. It’s the same stupid lesson over and over again. And you don’t get any better at learning it.

I bit my lip to keep from crying. The tears had found their way and were trying to come out.

I would run them out of me.

I took off in a full-on sprint, Huckleberry catching on right away and running out in front of me. I sped through the Old Town neighborhood, wanting to turn everything around me into a blur.

I ran for several blocks past the blue-lit houses. Running blindly, aimlessly, wishing I could outrun these feelings. Outrun all the heartache that always seemed to plague me. Run until I couldn’t feel anymore.

 Suddenly, Huckleberry stopped dead in his tracks in front of me.

His ears pricked up, and he gazed at a stand of trees in a vacant lot nestled between some houses. He started making low guttural sounds, the way he did when he saw an animal in the woods.

He didn’t respond when I tugged on the leash. His eyes glared out at something I couldn’t see, and his lips curled up into a growl, revealing his sharp teeth.

I stopped, breathing hard. I followed his gaze, looking for the animal that had caught his attention.

Suddenly there was a glimmer.

An orange spark, glowing from between two trees.

It grew in size for a moment and then quickly disappeared.

My mouth went dry.

It wasn’t any animal in the woods. 

“Hello?” I rasped. “Is someone there?”

I realized that my hands were shaking as I stepped cautiously forward.

My eyes scanned the trees, the moonlight casting their swaying shadows on the forest floor. Huckleberry continued to growl at something I couldn’t see.

Then I saw the flicker of light again, my eyes drawn to it like a pair of magnets.

And then, I saw him.

The shadow.

I gasped.

Huckleberry started barking loudly, a new urgency as he tugged harder on the other end of the leash. The flicker suddenly went out again, and then I heard the sound of branches cracking.

I stood there hardly able to breathe as I watched the figure weave behind trees until finally he was out of sight, swallowed whole by the forest.

Huckleberry kept barking, and I gripped the leash hard as he tried to lead me after the man. The dog got the better of me, and I was dragged into the woods, through the trees, to the place where I’d seen the light.

The porch light suddenly went on at the house across the street.

I looked down at the spot where the man had been standing. There was something there, something he left behind.

I kneeled down to get a better look.

I reached out a trembling hand to pick it up, but thought better of it. I didn’t want to contaminate the scene.

I grabbed a twig and pushed it until the front side was facing up.

I suddenly felt sick to my stomach.

It was a match book.

I recognized it as being one of the tourist match books they sold at the Christmas River convenience store.

On the front, a cartoon Santa stood in front of his sleigh, waving.

Words were written underneath. 

Christmas River: Where the Christmas Spirit Never Dies
.

Next to the book lay dozens and dozens of charred matches.

I wanted to throw up.

Huckleberry wouldn’t stop barking.

“What’s all that racket about?!” a voice yelled in my direction.

I stood up and looked out across the street at the house with the lights on.

An older woman was standing in the doorway in a bathrobe and slippers.

“Get your damn dog under control!”

I recognized the voice the minute I heard it.

Sarah Reinhart.

The house belonged to Sarah and Ronald Reinhart.

Chapter 38

“Long night?” Chrissy asked, hanging up her purse and grabbing a cowgirl apron.

“That’s putting it politely,” I said. “Hellish describes it a little better.”

I sat at the kitchen island, sipping a cup of coffee. I would have rather sipped something a little stronger.

I hadn’t gotten much done at all this morning. The walking dead didn’t make very good bakers. Even when they had several cups of steaming, black coffee already in them.

I’d spent most of the morning in dress rehearsal at the auditorium, running through the play multiple times. But my lines weren’t sticking like they should have been, and with the big day coming up tomorrow, I was in for an ugly 48 hours. Our final rehearsal was tonight, with the big event to follow tomorrow afternoon after the morning parade.

After seeing the man in the woods and finding a pile of matches outside of Sarah and Ronald Reinhart’s place the night before, I had called Daniel.

I hadn’t wanted to. In fact, I had even considered calling the former Sheriff Trumbow over him for a split second. But it seemed, in that moment, that maybe catching the arsonist was more important than our relationship problems.

The man in the woods had scared me. And finding that match book had given me goose bumps that I could still feel, even in the bright light of morning.

So I called Daniel. He didn’t answer until the sixth ring. He sounded out-of-it when he spoke.

“What’s wrong?” he said, his voice scratchy and loud.

“I saw him, Daniel,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady. “In the woods.”

He was there within ten minutes.

Dressed in the same clothes he’d been wearing that night at dinner.

I didn’t think it was possible, but my pain and despair deepened even more after I saw that.

He didn’t offer up any explanations.